10 Simple Healthy Kid-Approved Meals from Costco for Less than $100

I’m Melissa and today I’m sharing 10 quick easy and healthy meals that you can buy everything you need from one trip to Costco. These meals are kid/family friendly and you are going to love them. As a mom of five, these are some of my all-time favorite tried and true, go-to recipes. They are based on whole foods, come together quickly, and (nearly) everything you need for them can be found at Costco. One of my favorite parts of many of these recipes is that they are very easy to adapt. Does your family hate mushrooms? Leave them out or exchange them for something else. My kids are nuts for shrimp, but if you aren’t I’ve included instructions on how to sub chicken or beef. I’ve added lots of notes to each recipe so that you can find success in your own kitchen. The recipes tried and true and packed with vegetables, though your family won’t even notice. Plan on these recipes going into your regular rotation because I know you’ll be making them again and again.

Long live Costco! I know I’m not the only one who loves that place. Costco has so much more to offer than just delicious samples to keep you happy while shopping. Costco is awesome at carrying high quality products and many of those products are organic. It’s quickly becoming a very accessible and very affordable health food store. I know lots of you are big Costco fans too, so you are going to love this post.

The best part of this post is that I went to Costco, bought what I needed, and used it. You aren’t buying a million different things and having half of them go to waste. When you go to buy that gorgeous pack of 6 bell peppers, no worries, you’ll use them all up before the meal plan is through. I’m a big believer in planning well and avoiding food waste.

Here’s a list of the recipes for this healthy Costco-based meal plan:

Very Veggie Rice Pilaf served with Meat from a Rotisserie Chicken and Fruit

Easy Egg Bake

Cheesy Pasta Bake

Shrimp Fajitas

Breakfast Burritos

Very Veggies Pasta Sauce

Simple Vegetable Minestrone

Super Easy Flatbread Pizzas

Sweet Potato Curry

Quick and Easy Stir-fry

When it comes to getting the most bang for your healthy buck, Costco takes the cake in my book! I did some number crunching for you. These 10 meals cost less than $100 to make! My math was pretty loose (I was nursing a baby and doing the math with a pen and paper) but my total came out to $93.04 for all 10 meals! That is awesome! My total bill for everything included on the Costco shopping list was $182.10. I used up all of the fruits and veggies without any waste but I still have lots of rice, black beans, canned tomatoes, and other great pantry items left that I know I’ll use later. You won’t use all of the cheese or tortillas for these meals either, but again, the things you are left with are the things that are easy to use up for lunches and at other meals. The two shrimp dishes were the most expensive to make (coming in at almost $15 a meal). I like to make nice shrimp meals on the weekend instead of going out to eat. They feel fancier than normal and $15 for my family of six eaters is much cheaper than going out to dinner. The least expensive meals were the breakfast burritos, egg bake, and flatbread pizzas, coming in at just over $6 a meal. That is awesome! In the end the average is $9 a meal that feeds 4-6 people real delicious food. Hooray!

If you’d like to cut back on price I would sub chicken for the shrimp. The one ingredient I wouldn’t skip out on is the Kirkland Signature Organic Chicken Stock. This product comes in six 1-quart boxes and it will change your cooking game! It’s a main ingredient in the pasta bake, soup, rice, and a few other recipes. It really sets you up for a great tasting meal because it’s a high quality delicious stock. For the best results, use this stock!

Have you seen that funny meme that goes something like “I just bought $200 worth of groceries but I’m ordering a pizza because I’m tired from the hassle of buying groceries.”. Oh the truth in that statement. Shopping, especially with kids is plenty of work. In order to avoid picking up a take-and-bake pizza (we do that plenty, but I do try to save it for when I really need a break), I plan a simple meal using part of the rotisserie chicken. Have you tried Costco’s rotisserie chicken?! It’s so good! My Costco doesn’t carry the organic rotisserie chickens but I hear some stores do. How great is that?

Rotisserie Chicken with Very Veggie Rice Pilaf and Fruit on the side

So the first recipe on the list is for a simple rice dish served with part of the rotisserie chicken and a side of fruit. This is my go-to dinner the day I do my grocery shopping. It’s healthy, it’s filling, and it’s simple. Here’s a little trick. If you save part of your chicken meat before the bird hits the table you’ll easily get two meals out of it. I’ll just cut the chicken up and serve it in pieces and no one even notices some of the missing meat. The rest of the meals can be made in whatever order you’d like, but I’d plan on making the meals that have lots of peppers, squash, and mushrooms in them first because those items spoil the quickest.

These meals serve 4-6 people. A couple of recipes make a little more than others but they are a pretty great size for a family with maybe a few leftovers. All of the recipes I have been making for years. The cheesy pasta bake is my Aunt’s recipe, the stir-fry hails from my sister, the egg bake from a friend. These are the meals that I come back to again and again because they are easy, delicious, and healthy (but totally “normal” at the same time). And because you shopped at Costco, you know your ingredients are top notch. Making awesome dishes starts with delicious ingredients.

For the Rice Pilaf:

2 tablespoons olive oil

8 ounces Baby Bella Mushrooms

2 small zucchini/squash (1 pound)

1/2 an onion (about 1 cup chopped)

1 1/2 cups short grain brown rice

1 teaspoon garlic (the minced kind in the jar)

1 container stock (1 quart), depending on the rice you use this amount will vary

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

Instructions

Chop the mushrooms, zucchini, and onion.

In a large pan add the olive oil and heat over medium-high heat. Add the mushrooms, zucchini, and onion. Cook until the veggies are soft, about 5 minutes.

Add the rice and garlic and sauté for 1 minute.

Add the stock and seasoning and stir to combine.

Bring the mixture to a boil and then reduce the heat so that the rice is just simmering.

Cook until the rice is tender and most of the moisture is absorbed, stirring every 10 minutes or so. This should take about an hour.

Cook until the rice is tender and most of the moisture is absorbed, stirring every 10 minutes or so. This should take about an hour. (I normally spend this hour putting up the million things I just bought at Costco.)

Notes

I like to use short grain brown rice because it is stickier when cooked (the pieces stick together unlike a more traditional long grain rice in which the grains don’t stick together when cooked). I like it sticky because it’s easier for little people to eat. They seem to get more to their mouth and less to the floor when I use short grain rice. If you use short grain rice and stir this dish some when cooking the end product is going to be more like a risotto. It’s going to be creamy and thick and almost like porridge in texture. We love it like this. If you would like a more traditional rice dish, use long grain rice and don’t stir. If you are playing with the type of rice though you’ll want to adjust the amount of stock used as well as the cooking time to reflect the general instructions on the bag (brown rice will take more liquid than white rice will). This recipe can also be made in the rice cooker! Sauté the vegetables on the stove top first with the olive oil and then add them, the rice, stock, and seasoning, set it and forget it.

For the chicken, reserve two scant cups of shredded chicken for a later meal. If you’d like to cut up the bird to serve or pull the meat off of the bone you can do that.

Serve the chicken with the rice and a side of fruit. If you’d like a few more vegetables serve with a side of the frozen Normandy blend (heated of course).

Easy Egg Bake

Ingredients

1/2 an onion

1/2 pound of squash

4 slices of bacon

8 eggs

1/2 cup milk

1 cup grated cheese, about 4 ounces (I used sharp cheddar)

4 ounces of spinach

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

Instructions

Grate the squash and onion with your cheese grater (or dice them nice and small).

Spray a 9×9 inch baking dish with cooking spray and preheat the oven to 375 degrees

In a medium skillet cook the bacon until tender crisp. Remove the bacon from the pan and lay it on paper towels to help absorb extra grease. Pour the extra bacon grease from pan and return the pan to the stove (it will still have a layer of grease on the bottom since you haven’t cleaned it). Add the grated squash and onion to the pan and cook over medium high heat until the vegetables are tender and any cooking liquid that they have released has cooked off.

While the veggies are cooking, break your eggs into a bowl, add the milk and salt and pepper and beat with a fork to combine well.

Place the cooked vegetables in the bottom of the prepared dish. Add the spinach. Add the cheese. Crumble the cooked bacon over the top of the cheese. Pour the egg mixture over everything in the dish. Bake for 25-30 minutes until the center of the dish is set and no longer jiggles. Let the dish cool for 3-5 minutes before serving hot.

Notes

I like to chop the spinach because I just want little pieces to eat, not a whole leave. If you like the spinach more wilted, you can cook it with the other vegetables, but this makes it too mushy for my taste.You can bake this in different sized dishes, including a round pie plate. This also doubles well in a 9×13 inch dish. You will have to adjust the baking times depending on the dish you use. You know when it’s done when the center is set. I just shake the pan gently in the oven, and if the middle moves then I cook it another few minutes before repeating the shake test.

I love to grate the squash. When it is grated and cooked before adding it to the eggs it looks, feels, and tastes a lot like a hash brown style potato! The Costco bag had yellow and green zucchini in it and I choose to use the yellow squash in this dish because it really will get mistaken for potatoes (which go over better with my kids than squash). If I only have zucchini, then I’ll peel the outside to hide the green from them.

If dairy is an issue in your family, then you can omit the milk. It just makes the egg a little fluffier when baked. If bacon isn’t your thing, skip it and sauté the vegetables in olive oil. You can also sub the bacon for 4 ounces of cooked sausage or some cubed ham, which are all delicious.

This freezes great and reheats very well. I like to a batch to keep in the fridge for easy breakfasts. If I’m going to freeze this, I’ll just cut it into squares and put them in a single layer in a freezer bag or container.

Serve with a side of fruit, a smoothie, or even some muffins.

Creamy Chicken and Veggie Pasta Bake

Ingredients

1 package pasta (about a pound)

2-4 cups frozen vegetable (Normandy Blend)

1/2 cup butter

1/2 an onion chopped small

1/2 cup flour

1 teaspoon minced garlic (the minced kind in the jar)

1 carton chicken stock (1 quart)

2 cup shredded chicken (leftover from your rotisserie chicken)

2 cups shredded mozzarella

Instructions

Get a pot of water boiling for your pasta. Grease a 9×13 inch baking dish and set aside. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

When the water is boiling cook your pasta al’dente. This is normally about 2 minutes less than the package says for me. When the pasta has about a minute left, add the frozen vegetables to the water. When the pasta is cooked al dente drain the pasta and the vegetables. Let these hang out in your colander for a minute.

Return the now-empty pot back to the stove and add the butter and onion. Over medium heat, cook the onion in the butter until the onion is tender, about 3 minutes. Add the garlic and the flour. Stir to combine and let the mixture cook for about a minute. Slowly whisk in one carton of chicken stock. Bring the mixture up to a slow boil, stirring very often. Once the mixture starts to bubble cook for 1-2 minutes until it thickens. Remove from heat. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Add the pasta and veggies to the prepared dish. Add the chopped chicken on top of the pasta. Pour the sauce evenly over the dish. Sprinkle the top with the mozzarella. Place the dish in the oven and bake until the cheese melts and the sauce begins to bubble around the edges, about 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and let the pasta rest for 5 minutes before serving.

Notes

You are adding the vegetables to the cooking pasta to thaw them, not necessarily cook them. They’ll have time to cook in the oven, but it doesn’t work very well if you put them in the dish frozen when everything else is hot. If you forget to add them to the cooking water, you can place the frozen vegetables in the bottom of the colander and then pour the hot cooking water and pasta on top of them. Just be careful, the hot water splashes more easily when you do it like this.

To speed up the prep time for this dish, start making the sauce in a second pan while the pasta is cooking. So dinner on the table faster or less dishes – you decide!

This recipe freezes well. I like to make this same amount but put it into two 9 by 9 inch baking dishes. I’ll bake one for dinner and the other I won’t put in the oven. I’ll cover it well and put it in the freezer. When I want to cook it, I thaw it overnight in the fridge and then bake it until everything is hot. The noodles are a little bit softer but cooking once and eating twice is worth having soft noodles once in a while in my opinion.

Shrimp Fajitas

Ingredients

1 pound raw frozen shrimp, thawed

2 tablespoons butter or olive oil

1 teaspoon garlic (the minced kind in the jar)

1-2 tablespoons olive oil

1 red bell pepper, cut into strips

1 orange bell pepper, cut into strips

1 yellow bell pepper, cut into strips

1 large onion, cut into thin strips

1-2 tablespoons cumin

salt and pepper

juice of one lime

Cooked fresh tortillas

Grated cheese

Your favorite salsa or pico de gallo

Black beans

Avocado

Instructions

Preheat a large skillet over medium high heat. Add the butter and garlic and stir until the butter is melted. Add the shrimp and cook, stirring often, until the shrimp turns pink, about 4 minutes. Remove the shrimp from the pan and carefully wipe out the pan.

Return the pan to medium high heat and add the olive oil. Add the peppers and onions and cook until the peppers are tender-crisp, about 5 minutes. While the vegetables are cooking, remove the tails from the shrimp if they came with them on. Add the cumin, salt and pepper to taste, and the juice of one lime, stir to combine. Add the shrimp back to the pan, stir, cook until the shrimp are warmed again and then remove from the heat and serve right away. Serve on warm cooked fresh tortillas with cheese, salsa/pico, avocado and/or black beans.

Notes

If shrimp isn’t your favorite, you can replace it with chicken or steak, just be sure to cook and season the meat properly. If you’d like to grill the shrimp on the BBQ instead of cooking it in the pan that would also be really delicious.

My kids are crazy for shrimp, but I won’t let them pick them out of the pan to eat. If they are going to enjoy the shrimp, they get a scoop of the fajita mixture in a taco or on their plate. They get to eat the peppers along with everything else in order to enjoy the shrimp. I like to use the colored peppers because they are sweeter and less bitter than just green peppers.

Breakfast Burritos

Ingredients

1 large sweet potato, peeled and cubed

Olive oil

Salt

8 eggs

Chopped bell peppers

Grated cheese (I used sharp cheddar)

Diced avocado

Freshly cooked tortillas

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Put the chopped sweet potato on a rimmed baking sheet and drizzle it with olive oil (about a tablespoon). Use your hands to toss the sweet potatoes a bit so that they get coated with the oil. Sprinkle well with salt. Bake until the potatoes are tender and starting to brown on the bottom, about 25 minutes.

While the potatoes are cooking, scramble and cook the eggs. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

To make your breakfast burritos add some roasted sweet potatoes, scrambled eggs, bell pepper, cheese, and avocado to a warm cooked tortilla and enjoy. This is also excellent with a salsa verde. My kids like ketchup in their breakfast burrito.

Notes

If you are going to roast one sweet potato, you might as well roast a second on the same pan… I like to throw the roasted sweet potato in salads later or in eggs in the morning. It’s always nice to have some already cooked in the fridge.

This is also delicious with some crumbled cooked bacon in it.

Very Veggie Pasta Sauce

Ingredients

1 pound ground meat such a sausage or hamburger (optional)

1 onion, chopped

1 teaspoon garlic (the minced kind in the jar)

4 ounces baby bella mushrooms, chopped

1 cup chopped bell pepper

1 zucchini, chopped

1 can diced tomatoes (with the juice)

1 jar pasta sauce

2-3 teaspoons Italian seasoning

salt and pepper to taste

hot cooked pasta

Instructions

In a large skillet, brown the meat until cooked through and no longer pink. Drain extra grease from the pan. Add the onion, garlic, mushrooms, and bell pepper, cook until the onion is soft and translucent. Add the zucchini and cook until the squash starts to release its liquid and then cook for another 5-10 minutes until the liquid has cooked off.

Add the diced tomatoes, jar of pasta sauce, Italian seasoning, and salt. Stir to combine well and cook over medium heat, stirring often, until the sauce thickens slightly, about 15 minutes.

Salt and pepper to taste and then serve over hot cooked pasta with grated Parmesan.

Notes

To make this without the meat, simply omit the meat and sub in 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil to sauté the onion and bell pepper in. We really like it both ways. A hot Italian sausage is excellent in it.

This makes a ton of sauce. Depending on how much we eat, I’ll often stick half this batch in the freezer for later OR I’ll plan on using it to make lasagna or something else saucy. This sauce is also delicious on the flatbread pizzas in place of the jarred pasta sauce (use it like pizza sauce).

Simple Minestrone

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 onion, chopped

1 teaspoon garlic

4 ounces baby bella mushrooms, sliced

1 cup chopped bell pepper

1 zucchini, chopped

2 can diced tomatoes (with the juice)

1 carton chicken stock (1 quart)

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed

1-2 cups dry pasta (4-8 ounces)

1 tablespoon dried parsley or basil

Salt and pepper to taste

In a large pot add the olive oil and heat over medium high heat. Add the onion, garlic and mushrooms. Cook until the vegetables are tender, about 5 minutes.

Add the bell pepper, zucchini, tomatoes, chicken stock, and black beans. Stir to combine and reduce the heat to medium.

In a separate pan boil water and cook the pasta according to package directions.

Bring the soup to a slow simmer and cook until the zucchini is tender but not mushy, about 10 to 15 minutes. When the pasta is done cooking, drain it and rinse it well in cold water. Add the cooked pasta to the soup and stir to combine. Add the parsley or basil and plenty of salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot.

Notes

A smaller shaped pasta is more traditional in this soup, but it doesn’t really matter. I like to choose just basil or just parsley because if I get adding too many spices or if I use Italian seasoning then I feel like I’m eating thin pasta sauce. If you have fresh of either of the herbs they would be delicious. You’ll want to add about 3 times as much fresh compared to the dried.

Easy Flatbread Pizza

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Place the flatbread on a rimmed baking sheet. Add a few tablespoons of tomato sauce and spread them around the top of the flatbread with the back of a spoon. Top with cheese. Add your favorite toppings. Bake for 10-15 minutes until the cheese is melted and starting to bubble.

Notes

Easiest. Recipe. Ever. These are perfect to make for a quick lunch, easy dinner, and everything in between. I slice them into short strips once they come out of the oven and everyone loves the little pizza slices. This is a great meal to get your kids to help with, or put them in charge of completely if they are working on gaining some independence in the kitchen. This is a great way to use up odds and ends of vegetables hanging out in the fridge. The flatbread freeze well too, so pop them in the freezer if you aren’t going to use them all and plan on these simple pizzas when you need a meal in a pinch.

Sweet Potato Curry

Ingredients

2-3 tablespoons olive oil

1 tablespoon yellow curry powder

1 teaspoon Garam Masala

1 teaspoon cumin

1/2 an onion, chopped (about 1 cup)

1 teaspoon minced garlic

1/2 cup chopped bell pepper

1 large sweet potato, peeled and cubed

1 can full fat coconut milk

½ to 1 cup water

2-3 teaspoons soy sauce

chopped cilantro

lime wedges

hot cooked brown rice and/or warmed flatbread

Instructions

In a medium pot, add the olive oil, curry powder, Garam Masala, cumin, onion and garlic. Stir and cook over medium heat until the onion is soft, about 3 minutes. Add the bell pepper and sweet potato and cook another minute. Add the coconut milk, water (just fill the coconut milk can up about half way with water and dump it in), and soy sauce. Bring the mixture to a boil. Reduce the heat to low and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the sweet potato is tender and the mixture had thickened slightly, about 30 minutes. Serve over hot cooked rice with chopped cilantro and lime juice on top.

Notes

At the end of cooking, taste the dish and add a little more curry powder if needed, to taste. Some days I add lots and lots of curry powder and other days I like it with less, play with it! This is one of my favorite clean out the vegetable drawer dishes. You’ll want to be sure to use sweet potatoes because they are what is going to thicken the sauce, but you can add just about anything else in addition to them. We happen to love peas in this dish.

Preheat a large skillet over medium high heat. Add the butter and garlic and stir until the butter is melted. Add the shrimp and cook, stirring often, until the shrimp turns pink, about 4 minutes.

While the shrimp is cooking, add all of the sauce ingredients to a quart mason jar, add a lid, and shake well to combine.

When the shrimp is cooked through, reduce the heat to medium and pour the sauce over the shrimp. Stirring continuously cook until the sauce thickens and the color changes from a muddy brown to a cleaner, reddish color. This should take about 3 minutes.

Add the frozen vegetables and cook until the veggies are heated through.

To ensure there are no cornstarch lumps in the sauce I recommend combining the corn starch and the cold water and shaking those together thoroughly before adding the additional ingredients.

If you’d like the sauce a bit spicier, make it a few hours ahead of time with the red pepper flakes. Let the sauce rest in the fridge and re-shake before you are ready to use. Letting the pepper flakes sit in the sauce will gives them time to release more of their heat.

If shrimp isn’t your favorite then you can replace it with chicken or steak, just be sure to cook and season the meat properly.

A few tips from someone who just shopped and had made half of the things. 1) my bill was about $175 2) BUT you could easily make each dish three times with the quantity of stuff you get, which means 3) portion and freeze fresh ingredients after you use something once. 4) everything so far has been DELICIOUS. My picky 2 year old eats some of it, but my pick husband has loved all of it. 5) if you have a smaller family 3 here) prepare your fridge and work lunches for a ton of leftovers. 6) everything is delicious leftover. Oh and 7) the cheesy chicken bake isn’t in the email, just check the site for that one. So good. Thanks!

I’ve clicked on the link and even entered my email address and am seeing nothing. I’ve done this twice and both time I haven’t been able to view the Costco shopping list. I’ve also checked my junk mail to see if it ended up there and no luck. Would really like to make these recipes. Thanks.

It would be nice to have the number of servings for each recipe. I have a family of 6, including one teenaged boy. The curry as written definitely won’t be enough, and I think I will have to double or triple everything but the sauce. It would be nice to know how much extra I have to buy before going shopping.

I went to Costco today and was going to buy the rotisserie chicken, but then I noticed the ingredients in the chicken included sugar and dextrose! Did not get it. Make sure that the chicken is free from unnecessary added ingredients.

I requested the list and recipes using a gmail account and didn’t receive anything, so i tried again with a yahoo account and it worked, so if you didn’t get a response, try a different email server! (And it’s still missing the creamy chicken bake recipe, but that’s easy enough to look up on here, the shopping list is all i wanted and it was there!)